04.21.2012 #SweetSat Samples: Unforgiven

Riley Beckett's past just came back to haunt her ... and this time he's got a gun. UNFORGIVEN ... click image.

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Gage and Riley were once lovers, but a deadly twist of fate tore them apart. Now, one year later, they’re thrown together by a murder in which Gage was the intended victim and Riley is wanted for the crime.

In a recent sample, Riley found out Gage hadn’t quit drinking as he promised. Riley lost everyone she loved by defending Gage’s sobriety, so to find out it was all a lie — and that her father knew all along — devastated her. The first line of speech is hers.

“After the accident . . . when I left. I asked you—”

“You asked me not to drink. You asked me not to give in. Not to turn to the alcohol because . . . you were leaving me.”

“Have you?”

He looked at her, his face as solemn as she’d ever seen it. “Not a drop. I swear.”

“And you’re good for your word?”

“Yes.” The word hung between them, going nowhere.

She stopped her travels at the driver’s side door of the truck and grabbed the handle. “You also promised never to contact me again. Yet there you were in my living room, pointing a gun at my head. Bleeping liar.”

He opened his mouth, but she waved away the words. Nothing he could have said would change anything. No defense existed for what he’d done. He’d stolen her faith with his lies, and in a way he’d taken her daddy, too. The memories she clung to were now tainted with the secret her father kept, with the betrayal of siding with Gage, of allowing her to trust him while he made a fool of her. The whole town of Barefoot had probably laughed behind her back. Some might have even said she got what shedeserved, and maybe they were right. But the lie was over, and at least now she knew she’d gotten one thing right. Steeling herself against his betrayal, she met Gage’s eyes. “I can’t do this.”

“You can’t do what?”

“This. Just . . . call Maverick. Order up another truck or whatever you do. Just . . . goodbye, Gage.”

She paused, waiting for him to say something. But there was only silence buoyed by a cloud of anger and hurt. Tense seconds crawled past before he opened his mouth and then closed it. Then, without speaking, he held up his palms and stepped away from the truck.

Gage didn’t even try to stop her from going.

Flying blind through a mask of tears, she got in Maverick’s truck and left.

UNFORGIVEN

Riley Beckett’s past just came back to haunt her . . . and this time, he’s got a gun.

When Gage Lawton finds his brother shot dead on his back porch, every shred of evidence points to one person: Gage’s former lover, Riley. He and she didn’t part ways on good terms, and he’s not planning to rekindle anything now–not when he’s got a revolver pointed at her head and a finger on the trigger.

A year after Riley swore she and Gage were over, he returns in a hail of gunfire. One look into those achingly familiar blue eyes and she knows how wrong she was to let him go, but now far more than their heated past stands in the way. A twist of fate puts them in the crosshairs of a killer, leaving Riley with two slim options: trust her greatest betrayer or face a murderer on her own.

About Sarah Ballance

Sarah and her husband of what he calls “many long, long years” live on the mid-Atlantic coast with their six young children, all of whom are perfectly adorable when they’re asleep. She never dreamed of becoming an author, but as a homeschooling mom, she often jokes she writes fiction because if she wants anyone to listen to her, she has to make them up. As it turns out, her characters aren’t much better than the kids, but nevertheless, you’ll find her writing sexy contemporary romance for Entangled Publishing until they throw her out. To learn more, visit http://sarahballance.com.